Would It Be Possible to Read This Essay as a Serious Proposal

1729 satirical essay by Jonathan Swift

A Modest Proposal

Author	Jonathan Swift
Genre	Satirical essay
Publication date	1729
Text	A Modest Proposal at Wikisource

A Small-scale Proposal For preventing the Children of Poor People From being a Burthen to Their Parents or Country, and For making them Benign to the Publick ,^[1] commonly referred to as A Modest Proposal , is a Juvenalian satirical essay written and published anonymously by Jonathan Swift in 1729. The essay suggests that the impoverished Irish might ease their economic troubles by selling their children as food to rich gentlemen and ladies. This satirical hyperbole mocked heartless attitudes towards the poor, predominantly Irish Catholic (i.e., "Papists")^[2] as well every bit British policy toward the Irish in full general.

In English writing, the phrase "a modest proposal" is now conventionally an innuendo to this mode of straight-faced satire.

Synopsis [edit]

Swift'southward essay is widely held to be one of the greatest examples of sustained irony in the history of the English language. Much of its daze value derives from the fact that the first portion of the essay describes the plight of starving beggars in Ireland, so that the reader is unprepared for the surprise of Swift'due south solution when he states: "A young good for you child well nursed, is, at a year old, a nigh succulent nourishing and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, broiled, or boiled; and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricassee, or a ragout."^[1]

Swift goes to great lengths to support his argument, including a listing of possible preparation styles for the children, and calculations showing the fiscal benefits of his suggestion. He uses methods of argument throughout his essay which lampoon the so-influential William Piddling and the social engineering popular amidst followers of Francis Bacon. These lampoons include appealing to the authorization of "a very knowing American of my acquaintance in London" and "the famous Psalmanazar, a native of the island Formosa" (who had already confessed to not being from Formosa in 1706).

In the tradition of Roman satire, Swift introduces the reforms he is really suggesting by paralipsis:

Therefore let no human being talk to me of other expedients: Of taxing our absentees at five shillings a pound: Of using neither dress, nor household furniture, except what is of our ain growth and manufacture: Of utterly rejecting the materials and instruments that promote foreign luxury: Of curing the expensiveness of pride, vanity, idleness, and gaming in our women: Of introducing a vein of parsimony, prudence and temperance: Of learning to dearest our country, wherein we differ even from Laplanders, and the inhabitants of Topinamboo: Of quitting our animosities and factions, nor acting whatever longer similar the Jews, who were murdering one some other at the very moment their city was taken: Of being a piddling cautious not to sell our state and consciences for aught: Of education landlords to have at to the lowest degree one caste of mercy towards their tenants. Lastly, of putting a spirit of honesty, industry, and skill into our shop-keepers, who, if a resolution could now be taken to purchase only our native goods, would immediately unite to cheat and exact upon united states in the cost, the measure, and the goodness, nor could ever withal be brought to make one fair proposal of just dealing, though ofttimes and earnestly invited to it. Therefore I repeat, allow no man talk to me of these and the similar expedients, 'till he hath at to the lowest degree some glympse of hope, that in that location will ever be some hearty and sincere endeavor to put them into practice.

Population solutions [edit]

George Wittkowsky argued that Swift'due south main target in A Pocket-sized Proposal was non the conditions in Ireland, but rather the tin can-practice spirit of the times that led people to devise a number of illogical schemes that would purportedly solve social and economic ills.^[3] Swift was peculiarly attacking projects that tried to ready population and labour issues with a simple cure-all solution.^[iv] A memorable example of these sorts of schemes "involved the idea of running the poor through a joint-stock company".^[4] In response, Swift's Minor Proposal was "a burlesque of projects concerning the poor"^[5] that were in vogue during the early 18th century.

A Modest Proposal also targets the computing way people perceived the poor in designing their projects. The pamphlet targets reformers who "regard people as commodities".^[6] In the piece, Swift adopts the "technique of a political arithmetician"^[7] to bear witness the utter ridiculousness of trying to show any proposal with dispassionate statistics.

Critics differ about Swift's intentions in using this false-mathematical philosophy. Edmund Wilson argues that statistically "the logic of the 'Small-scale proposal' tin can be compared with defence of crime (arrogated to Marx) in which he argues that crime takes care of the superfluous population".^[7] Wittkowsky counters that Swift'southward satiric use of statistical analysis is an endeavour to enhance his satire that "springs from a spirit of bitter mockery, non from the delight in calculations for their own sake".^[viii]

Rhetoric [edit]

Author Charles K. Smith argues that Swift's rhetorical way persuades the reader to hate the speaker and pity the Irish. Swift'south specific strategy is twofold, using a "trap"^[ix] to create sympathy for the Irish and a dislike of the narrator who, in the span of one sentence, "details vividly and with rhetorical accent the grinding poverty" but feels emotion solely for members of his own class.^[10] Swift's utilise of gripping details of poverty and his narrator'south absurd approach towards them create "ii opposing points of view" that "amerce the reader, perhaps unconsciously, from a narrator who can view with 'melancholy' detachment a subject that Swift has directed us, rhetorically, to see in a much less discrete way."^[10]

Swift has his proposer farther degrade the Irish gaelic past using language unremarkably reserved for animals. Lewis argues that the speaker uses "the vocabulary of animal husbandry"^[11] to describe the Irish. Once the children take been commodified, Swift's rhetoric can easily turn "people into animals, and then meat, and from meat, logically, into tonnage worth a price per pound".^[11]

Swift uses the proposer's serious tone to highlight the applesauce of his proposal. In making his argument, the speaker uses the conventional, textbook-approved society of argument from Swift's fourth dimension (which was derived from the Latin rhetorician Quintilian).^[12] The contrast betwixt the "careful control against the almost inconceivable perversion of his scheme" and "the ridiculousness of the proposal" create a situation in which the reader has "to consider merely what perverted values and assumptions would allow such a diligent, thoughtful, and conventional man to propose so perverse a plan".^[12]

Influences [edit]

Scholars have speculated about which before works Swift may have had in listen when he wrote A Modest Proposal.

Tertullian's Apology [edit]

James William Johnson argues that A Modest Proposal was largely influenced and inspired by Tertullian'due south Apology: a satirical attack against early Roman persecution of Christianity. Johnson believes that Swift saw major similarities between the 2 situations.^[13] Johnson notes Swift'southward obvious affinity for Tertullian and the bold stylistic and structural similarities betwixt the works A Modest Proposal and Apology.^[14] In structure, Johnson points out the aforementioned central theme, that of cannibalism and the eating of babies too as the same final statement, that "man depravity is such that men volition try to justify their own cruelty past accusing their victims of being lower than human being".^[xiii] Stylistically, Swift and Tertullian share the same command of sarcasm and language.^[13] In agreement with Johnson, Donald C. Baker points out the similarity betwixt both authors' tones and use of irony. Bakery notes the uncanny style that both authors imply an ironic "justification past ownership" over the subject of sacrificing children—Tertullian while attacking pagan parents, and Swift while attacking the English mistreatment of the Irish gaelic poor.^[15]

Defoe's The Generous Projector [edit]

It has also been argued that A Modest Proposal was, at least in part, a response to the 1728 essay The Generous Projector or, A Friendly Proposal to Prevent Murder and Other Enormous Abuses, By Erecting an Hospital for Foundlings and Bastard Children by Swift's rival Daniel Defoe.^[16]

Mandeville'due south Small Defence force of Publick Stews [edit]

Bernard Mandeville's Modest Defense of Publick Stews asked to introduce public and state controlled bordellos. The 1726 paper acknowledges women'due south interests and – while not beingness a completely satirical text – has likewise been discussed as an inspiration for Jonathan Swift's title.^{[17] [xviii]} Mandeville had past 1705 already become famous for the Fable of The Bees and deliberations on individual vices and public benefits.

John Locke's Commencement Treatise of Government [edit]

John Locke commented: "Be information technology so equally Sir Robert says, that Aforetime, it was usual for Men to sell and Castrate their Children. Let it be, that they exposed them; Add to it, if y'all please, for this is notwithstanding greater Power, that they begat them for their Tables to fat and consume them: If this proves a correct to do so, we may, by the same Argument, justifie Infidelity, Incest and Sodomy, for there are examples of these too, both Ancient and Modern; Sins, which I suppose, have the Principle Aggravation from this, that they cross the main intention of Nature, which willeth the increase of Mankind, and the continuation of the Species in the highest perfection, and the distinction of Families, with the Security of the Matrimony Bed, as necessary thereunto". (First Treatise, sec. 59).

Economic themes [edit]

Robert Phiddian's article "Accept y'all eaten yet? The Reader in A Modest Proposal" focuses on two aspects of A Pocket-size Proposal: the voice of Swift and the voice of the Proposer. Phiddian stresses that a reader of the pamphlet must learn to distinguish between the satirical vocalization of Jonathan Swift and the apparent economical projections of the Proposer. He reminds readers that "there is a gap between the narrator's meaning and the text'due south, and that a moral-political argument is being carried out by means of parody".^[19]

While Swift's proposal is obviously not a serious economic proposal, George Wittkowsky, author of "Swift's Modest Proposal: The Biography of an Early Georgian Pamphlet", argues that to sympathize the piece fully it is important to understand the economics of Swift'due south fourth dimension. Wittowsky argues that not enough critics have taken the time to focus directly on the mercantilism and theories of labour in 18th century England. "If i regards the Modest Proposal just as a criticism of condition, near all one can say is that weather condition were bad and that Swift's irony brilliantly underscored this fact".^[20]

"People are the riches of a nation" [edit]

At the showtime of a new industrial historic period in the 18th century, it was believed that "people are the riches of the nation", and at that place was a general religion in an economy that paid its workers depression wages because high wages meant workers would work less.^[21] Furthermore, "in the mercantilist view no child was also young to go into manufacture". In those times, the "somewhat more humane attitudes of an earlier day had all but disappeared and the laborer had come to exist regarded every bit a commodity".^[xix]

Louis A. Landa equanimous a conducive analysis when he noted that it would have been healthier for the Irish economic system to more than appropriately utilize their human avails by giving the people an opportunity to "become a source of wealth to the nation" or else they "must turn to begging and thievery".^[22] This opportunity may have included giving the farmers more coin to work for, diversifying their professions, or even consider enslaving their people to lower coin usage and build upward financial stock in Ireland. Landa wrote that, "Swift is maintaining that the maxim—people are the riches of a nation—applies to Ireland only if Ireland is permitted slavery or cannibalism"^[23]

Landa presents Swift's A Minor Proposal as a critique of the popular and unjustified maxim of mercantilism in the 18th century that "people are the riches of a nation".^[22] Swift presents the dire state of Republic of ireland and shows that mere population itself, in Ireland's case, did non always mean greater wealth and economy.^[23] The uncontrolled proverb fails to accept into account that a person who does non produce in an economical or political way makes a state poorer, non richer.^[23] Swift likewise recognises the implications of this fact in making mercantilist philosophy a paradox: the wealth of a country is based on the poverty of the majority of its citizens.^[23] Swift however, Landa argues, is not but criticising economic maxims but also addressing the fact that England was denying Irish citizens their natural rights and dehumanising them past viewing them as a mere article.^[23]

The public's reaction [edit]

Swift'southward essay created a backlash within the community later its publication. The piece of work was aimed at the aristocracy, and they responded in turn. Several members of society wrote to Swift regarding the work. Lord Bathurst's letter intimated that he certainly understood the message, and interpreted it as a work of comedy:

12 February 1729–30:

I did immediately propose it to Lady Bathurst, as your advice, specially for her last boy, which was built-in the plumpest, finest thing, that could exist seen; but she fell in a passion, and bid me send you give-and-take, that she would not follow your direction, simply that she would breed him upward to exist a parson, and he should live upon the fat of the state; or a lawyer, and so, instead of being eat himself, he should devour others. You know women in passion never heed what they say; only, as she is a very reasonable adult female, I have almost brought her over at present to your stance; and having convinced her, that as matters stood, we could not mayhap maintain all the nine, she does brainstorm to call up information technology reasonable the youngest should raise fortunes for the eldest: and upon that foot a man may perform family duty with more courage and zeal; for, if he should happen to get twins, the selling of ane might provide for the other. Or if, by any accident, while his wife lies in with one child, he should get a second upon the body of some other adult female, he might dispose of the fattest of the 2, and that would aid to breed up the other. The more I call up upon this scheme, the more than reasonable it appears to me; and it ought by no means to be confined to Ireland; for, in all probability, we shall, in a very trivial time, be altogether as poor here every bit you are in that location. I believe, indeed, we shall carry information technology further, and not confine our luxury simply to the eating of children; for I happened to peep the other day into a large assembly [Parliament] not far from Westminster-hall, and I plant them roasting a great fat boyfriend, [ Walpole again ] For my own office, I had not the least inclination to a slice of him; but, if I guessed right, four or five of the company had a devilish mind to be at him. Well, adieu, yous begin now to wish I had ended, when I might take done it so conveniently.^[24]

Modern usage [edit]

A Modest Proposal is included in many literature courses equally an example of early modern western satire. It also serves as an introduction to the concept and use of argumentative linguistic communication, lending itself to secondary and post-secondary essay courses. Outside of the realm of English studies, A Pocket-sized Proposal is included in many comparative and global literature and history courses, equally well as those of numerous other disciplines in the arts, humanities, and fifty-fifty the social sciences.^{[ original research? ]}

The essay's arroyo has been copied many times. In his book A Small-scale Proposal (1984), the evangelical author Francis Schaeffer emulated Swift'due south piece of work in a social bourgeois polemic against abortion and euthanasia, imagining a future dystopia that advocates recycling of aborted embryos, fetuses, and some disabled infants with chemical compound intellectual, physical and physiological difficulties. (Such Baby Doe Rules cases were and then a major concern of the US anti-ballgame movement of the early 1980s, which viewed selective treatment of those infants as inability discrimination.)

In his book A Pocket-size Proposal for America (2013), statistician Howard Friedman opens with a satirical reflection of the extreme drive to fiscal stability by ultra-conservatives.

In the 1998 edition of The Handmaid's Tale past Margaret Atwood in that location is a quote from A Small Proposal before the introduction.^[25]

A Modest Video Game Proposal is the title of an open letter sent past activist/erstwhile attorney Jack Thompson on x October 2005. He proposed that someone should "create, manufacture, distribute, and sell a video game" that would let players to act out a scenario in which the game grapheme kills video game developers.^{[26] [27]}

Hunter S. Thompson's Fearfulness and Loathing in America: The Barbarous Odyssey of an Outlaw Journalist includes a letter in which he uses Swift's approach in connection with the Vietnam War. Thompson writes a alphabetic character to a local Aspen paper informing them that, on Christmas Eve, he is going to use napalm to burn a number of dogs and hopefully any humans they find. The alphabetic character protests against the burning of Vietnamese people occurring overseas.

The 2013 horror film Butcher Boys, written by the original The Texas Chain Saw Massacre scribe Kim Henkel, is said to be an updating of Jonathan Swift's A Modest Proposal. Henkel imagined the descendants of folks who really took Swift up on his proposal. ^[28] The film opens with a quote from J. Swift. ^[29]

On 30 November 2017, Jonathan Swift's 350th birthday, The Washington Post published a cavalcade entitled "Why Alabamians should consider eating Democrats' babies", by Alexandra Petri.^[xxx]

In July 2019, Due east. Jean Carroll published a volume titled What Do We Need Men For?: A Modest Proposal, discussing problematic behaviour of male humans.^{[31] [32]}

On iii October 2019, a satirist spoke upwardly at an event for Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, claiming that a solution to the climate crisis was "we need to swallow the babies".^[33] The individual likewise wore a T-shirt saying "Save The Planet, Swallow The Children". This stunt was understood past many^[34] as a modern application of A Modest Proposal.

On 16 January 2022, San Francisco Relate published an editorial by Joe Matthews titled "Opinion: Want true equity? I advise, modestly, forcing California parents to swap children"^[35] in which the author makes "a modest proposal" recommending that rich people give their children to poor people and poor people give their children to rich people every bit a manner of achieving class equity.

Notes [edit]

1. ^ ^{a b} A Modest Proposal, past Dr. Jonathan Swift. Project Gutenberg. 27 July 2008. Retrieved ten January 2012.
2. ^ Swift notes that "the number of Popish infants, is at to the lowest degree 3 to one in this kingdom, and therefore information technology will take one some other collateral reward, by lessening the number of Papists among us."
3. ^ Wittkowsky, Swift'southward Pocket-sized Proposal, p. 76
4. ^ ^{a b} Wittkowsky, Swift's Modest Proposal, p. 85
5. ^ Wittkowsky, Swift's Small-scale Proposal, p. 88
6. ^ Wittkowsky, Swift's Pocket-size Proposal, p. 101
7. ^ ^{a b} Wittkowsky, Swift's Pocket-size Proposal, p. 95
8. ^ Wittkowsky, Swift's Pocket-size Proposal, p. 98
9. ^ Smith, Toward a Participatory Rhetoric, p. 135
10. ^ ^{a b} Smith, Toward a Participatory Rhetoric, p. 136
11. ^ ^{a b} Smith, Toward a Participatory Rhetoric, p. 138
12. ^ ^{a b} Smith, Toward a Participatory Rhetoric, p. 139
13. ^ ^{a b c} Johnson, Tertullian and A Minor Proposal, p. 563
14. ^ Johnson, Tertullian and A Small Proposal, p. 562
15. ^ Baker, Tertullian and Swift's A Modest Proposal, p. 219
16. ^ Waters, Juliet (xix Feb 2009). "A minor but failed proposal". Montreal Mirror. Archived from the original on 27 July 2020. Retrieved 10 January 2012.
17. ^ Eine Streitschrift…, Essay von Ursula Pia Jauch. Carl Hanser Verlag, München 2001.
18. ^ Primer, I. (fifteen March 2006). Bernard Mandeville'due south "A Minor Defence of Publick Stews": Prostitution and Its Discontents in Early Georgian England. Springer. ISBN9781403984609.
19. ^ ^{a b} Phiddian, Accept Yous Eaten Nonetheless?, p. 6
20. ^ Phiddian, Have You Eaten Yet?, p. three
21. ^ Phiddian, Take You Eaten All the same?, p. 4
22. ^ ^{a b} Landa, A Modest Proposal and Populousness, p. 161
23. ^ ^{a b c d e} Landa, A Minor Proposal and Populousness, p. 165
24. ^ Swift, Jonathan; Scott, Sir Walter (1814). The Works of Jonathan Swift: Containing Additional Messages, Tracts, and Poems Not Hitherto Published; with Notes and a Life of the Writer. A. Constable.
25. ^ Atwood, Margaret. "The Handmaid's Tale". www.goodreads.com.
26. ^ Saunderson, Matt (x October 2005). "Chaser Proposes Vehement Game". GameCube Advanced. Avant-garde Media Network. Archived from the original on thirty October 2005.
27. ^ Gibson, Ellie (18 October 2005). "Thompson refuses to make $10k donation to charity". Eurogamer . Retrieved two March 2021.
28. ^ O'Connell, Joe. "A 'Texas Concatenation Saw' Pedigree". www.austinchronicle.com.
29. ^ Barton, Steve (vi September 2013). "Exclusive: Kim Henkel Talks Butcher Boys". www.dreadcentral.com.
30. ^ Petri, Alexandra (thirty November 2017). "Why Alabamians should consider eating Democrats' babies". The Washington Post . Retrieved 30 Nov 2017.
31. ^ Carroll, East. Jean (21 June 2019). "Donald Trump Assaulted Me, Just He'south Not Lonely on My List of Hideous Men". The Cutting . Retrieved 5 October 2019.
32. ^ "What Exercise We Need Men For?: A Small Proposal | IndieBound.org". www.indiebound.org . Retrieved 5 October 2019.
33. ^ 'We Need to Eat the Babies!' Climate Activist Confronts AOC at New York Town Hall, archived from the original on 22 November 2021, retrieved four October 2019
34. ^ Malaea, Marika (4 October 2019). "'Eat the babies!': Twitter reacts to a surprise ending to the Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez boondocks hall coming together". Newsweek . Retrieved 4 October 2019.
35. ^ Stance: Want true disinterestedness? I suggest, modestly, forcing California parents to swap children

References [edit]

• Baker, Donald C (1957), "Tertullian and Swift's A Small Proposal", The Classical Periodical, 52: 219–220
• Johnson, James William (1958), "Tertullian and A Small Proposal", Modern Linguistic communication Notes, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 73 (8): 561–563, doi:x.2307/3043246, JSTOR 3043246 (subscription needed)
• Landa, Louis A (1942), "A Modest Proposal and Populousness", Modern Philology, 40 (2): 161–170, doi:10.1086/388567, S2CID 159465806
• Phiddian, Robert (1996), "Have You Eaten Still? The Reader in A Modest Proposal", SEL: Studies in English Literature 1500–1900, Rice University, 36 (3): 603–621, doi:ten.2307/450801, hdl:2328/746, JSTOR 450801
• Smith, Charles Kay (1968), "Toward a Participatory Rhetoric: Teaching Swift's Modest Proposal", College English, National Council of Teachers of English language, 30 (2): 135–149, doi:10.2307/374449, JSTOR 374449
• Wittkowsky, George (1943), "Swift'due south Modest Proposal: The Biography of an Early Georgian Pamphlet", Journal of the History of Ideas, Academy of Pennsylvania Press, 4 (1): 75–104, doi:x.2307/2707237, JSTOR 2707237

External links [edit]

• A Modest Proposal (CELT)
• A Small Proposal (Gutenberg)
• A Modest Proposal – Annotated text aligned to Common Core Standards
• A Modest Proposal public domain audiobook at LibriVox
• A Minor Proposal BBC Radio 4 In Our Time with Melvyn Bragg
• 'A modest proposal For preventing the children of poor people From existence a Burthen to their Parents or the Country, And for making them Beneficial to the publick. The Tertiary Edition, Dublin, Printed: And Reprinted at London, for Weaver Bickerton, in Devereux-Court near the Middle-Temple, 1730.
• Proposal to eat the children a curt film based upon Swift'south novel.

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Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Modest_Proposal

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